The Barriers to Intra-Opposition Cooperation in the Post-Communist World: Evidence from Kyrgyzstan

Abstract

What explains the failure of the opposition in many post-communist states to emerge as a legitimate and enduring force in politics? Based on saturation inter-viewing of Kyrgyzstan's elite and the literature on Krygyzstani politics, this article examines opposition attitudes and beliefs. Opposition elites' ideas about relations between government and opposition and within the opposition itself are detailed and analyzed to understand how political actors view incentives and constraints created by their individual resources and the political and economic environment. In this case study, several assumptions of the comparative literature on oppositions in authoritarian and hybrid regimes are tested in analyzing the forms, logic, and limits of opposition in post-communist states.